ENGLAND UNDER EDWARD THE FIRST, CALLED LONGSHANKS
It was now the year of our Lord one thousand two hundred and
seventy-two; and Prince Edward, the heir to the throne, being away in
the Holy Land, knew nothing of his father’s death. The Barons, however,
proclaimed him King, immediately after the Royal funeral; and the
people very willingly consented, since most men knew too well by this
time what the horrors of a contest for the crown were. So King Edward
the First, called, in a not very complimentary manner, Longshanks,
because of the slenderness of his legs, was peacefully accepted by the
English Nation.
His legs had need to be strong, however long and thin they were; for
they had to support him through many difficulties on the fiery sands of
Asia, where his small force of soldiers fainted, died, deserted, and
seemed to melt away. But his prowess made light of it, and he said, ‘I
will go on, if I go on with no other follower than my groom!’
A Prince of this spirit gave the Turks a deal of trouble. He stormed
Nazareth, at which place, of all places on earth, I am sorry to relate,
he made a frightful slaughter of innocent people; and then he went to
Acre, where he got a truce of ten years from the Sultan. He had very
nearly lost his life in Acre, through the treachery of a Saracen Noble,
called the Emir of Jaffa, who, making the pretence that he had some
idea of turning Christian and wanted to know all about that religion,
sent a trusty messenger to Edward very often—with a dagger in his
sleeve. At last, one Friday in Whitsun week, when it was very hot, and
all the sandy prospect lay beneath the blazing sun, burnt up like a
great overdone biscuit, and Edward was lying on a couch, dressed for
coolness in only a loose robe, the messenger, with his
chocolate-coloured face and his bright dark eyes and white teeth, came
creeping in with a letter, and kneeled down like a tame tiger. But, the
moment Edward stretched out his hand to take the letter, the tiger made
a spring at his heart. He was quick, but Edward was quick too. He
seized the traitor by his chocolate throat, threw him to the ground,
and slew him with the very dagger he had drawn. The weapon had struck
Edward in the arm, and although the wound itself was slight, it
threatened to be mortal, for the blade of the dagger had been smeared
with poison. Thanks, however, to a better surgeon than was often to be
found in those times, and to some wholesome herbs, and above all, to
his faithful wife, Eleanor, who devotedly nursed him, and is said by
some to have sucked the poison from the wound with her own red lips
(which I am very willing to believe), Edward soon recovered and was
sound again.
As the King his father had sent entreaties to him to return home, he
now began the journey. He had got as far as Italy, when he met
messengers who brought him intelligence of the King’s death. Hearing
that all was quiet at home, he made no haste to return to his own
dominions, but paid a visit to the Pope, and went in state through
various Italian Towns, where he was welcomed with acclamations as a
mighty champion of the Cross from the Holy Land, and where he received
presents of purple mantles and prancing horses, and went along in great
triumph. The shouting people little knew that he was the last English
monarch who would ever embark in a crusade, or that within twenty years
every conquest which the Christians had made in the Holy Land at the
cost of so much blood, would be won back by the Turks. But all this
came to pass.
There was, and there is, an old town standing in a plain in France,
called Châlons. When the King was coming towards this place on his way
to England, a wily French Lord, called the Count of Châlons, sent him a
polite challenge to come with his knights and hold a fair tournament
with the Count and _his_ knights, and make a day of it with sword and
lance. It was represented to the King that the Count of Châlons was not
to be trusted, and that, instead of a holiday fight for mere show and
in good humour, he secretly meant a real battle, in which the English
should be defeated by superior force.
The King, however, nothing afraid, went to the appointed place on the
appointed day with a thousand followers. When the Count came with two
thousand and attacked the English in earnest, the English rushed at
them with such valour that the Count’s men and the Count’s horses soon
began to be tumbled down all over the field. The Count himself seized
the King round the neck, but the King tumbled _him_ out of his saddle
in return for the compliment, and, jumping from his own horse, and
standing over him, beat away at his iron armour like a blacksmith
hammering on his anvil. Even when the Count owned himself defeated and
offered his sword, the King would not do him the honour to take it, but
made him yield it up to a common soldier. There had been such fury
shown in this fight, that it was afterwards called the little Battle of
Châlons.
The English were very well disposed to be proud of their King after
these adventures; so, when he landed at Dover in the year one thousand
two hundred and seventy-four (being then thirty-six years old), and
went on to Westminster where he and his good Queen were crowned with
great magnificence, splendid rejoicings took place. For the
coronation-feast there were provided, among other eatables, four
hundred oxen, four hundred sheep, four hundred and fifty pigs, eighteen
wild boars, three hundred flitches of bacon, and twenty thousand fowls.
The fountains and conduits in the street flowed with red and white wine
instead of water; the rich citizens hung silks and cloths of the
brightest colours out of their windows to increase the beauty of the
show, and threw out gold and silver by whole handfuls to make scrambles
for the crowd. In short, there was such eating and drinking, such music
and capering, such a ringing of bells and tossing of caps, such a
shouting, and singing, and revelling, as the narrow overhanging streets
of old London City had not witnessed for many a long day. All the
people were merry except the poor Jews, who, trembling within their
houses, and scarcely daring to peep out, began to foresee that they
would have to find the money for this joviality sooner or later.
To dismiss this sad subject of the Jews for the present, I am sorry to
add that in this reign they were most unmercifully pillaged. They were
hanged in great numbers, on accusations of having clipped the King’s
coin—which all kinds of people had done. They were heavily taxed; they
were disgracefully badged; they were, on one day, thirteen years after
the coronation, taken up with their wives and children and thrown into
beastly prisons, until they purchased their release by paying to the
King twelve thousand pounds. Finally, every kind of property belonging
to them was seized by the King, except so little as would defray the
charge of their taking themselves away into foreign countries. Many
years elapsed before the hope of gain induced any of their race to
return to England, where they had been treated so heartlessly and had
suffered so much.
If King Edward the First had been as bad a king to Christians as he was
to Jews, he would have been bad indeed. But he was, in general, a wise
and great monarch, under whom the country much improved. He had no love
for the Great Charter—few Kings had, through many, many years—but he
had high qualities. The first bold object which he conceived when he
came home, was, to unite under one Sovereign England, Scotland, and
Wales; the two last of which countries had each a little king of its
own, about whom the people were always quarrelling and fighting, and
making a prodigious disturbance—a great deal more than he was worth. In
the course of King Edward’s reign he was engaged, besides, in a war
with France. To make these quarrels clearer, we will separate their
histories and take them thus. Wales, first. France, second. Scotland,
third.
Llewellyn was the Prince of Wales. He had been on the side of the
Barons in the reign of the stupid old King, but had afterwards sworn
allegiance to him. When King Edward came to the throne, Llewellyn was
required to swear allegiance to him also; which he refused to do. The
King, being crowned and in his own dominions, three times more required
Llewellyn to come and do homage; and three times more Llewellyn said he
would rather not. He was going to be married to Eleanor de Montfort, a
young lady of the family mentioned in the last reign; and it chanced
that this young lady, coming from France with her youngest brother,
Emeric, was taken by an English ship, and was ordered by the English
King to be detained. Upon this, the quarrel came to a head. The King
went, with his fleet, to the coast of Wales, where, so encompassing
Llewellyn, that he could only take refuge in the bleak mountain region
of Snowdon in which no provisions could reach him, he was soon starved
into an apology, and into a treaty of peace, and into paying the
expenses of the war. The King, however, forgave him some of the hardest
conditions of the treaty, and consented to his marriage. And he now
thought he had reduced Wales to obedience.
But the Welsh, although they were naturally a gentle, quiet, pleasant
people, who liked to receive strangers in their cottages among the
mountains, and to set before them with free hospitality whatever they
had to eat and drink, and to play to them on their harps, and sing
their native ballads to them, were a people of great spirit when their
blood was up. Englishmen, after this affair, began to be insolent in
Wales, and to assume the air of masters; and the Welsh pride could not
bear it. Moreover, they believed in that unlucky old Merlin, some of
whose unlucky old prophecies somebody always seemed doomed to remember
when there was a chance of its doing harm; and just at this time some
blind old gentleman with a harp and a long white beard, who was an
excellent person, but had become of an unknown age and tedious, burst
out with a declaration that Merlin had predicted that when English
money had become round, a Prince of Wales would be crowned in London.
Now, King Edward had recently forbidden the English penny to be cut
into halves and quarters for halfpence and farthings, and had actually
introduced a round coin; therefore, the Welsh people said this was the
time Merlin meant, and rose accordingly.
King Edward had bought over Prince David, Llewellyn’s brother, by
heaping favours upon him; but he was the first to revolt, being perhaps
troubled in his conscience. One stormy night, he surprised the Castle
of Hawarden, in possession of which an English nobleman had been left;
killed the whole garrison, and carried off the nobleman a prisoner to
Snowdon. Upon this, the Welsh people rose like one man. King Edward,
with his army, marching from Worcester to the Menai Strait, crossed
it—near to where the wonderful tubular iron bridge now, in days so
different, makes a passage for railway trains—by a bridge of boats that
enabled forty men to march abreast. He subdued the Island of Anglesea,
and sent his men forward to observe the enemy. The sudden appearance of
the Welsh created a panic among them, and they fell back to the bridge.
The tide had in the meantime risen and separated the boats; the Welsh
pursuing them, they were driven into the sea, and there they sunk, in
their heavy iron armour, by thousands. After this victory Llewellyn,
helped by the severe winter-weather of Wales, gained another battle;
but the King ordering a portion of his English army to advance through
South Wales, and catch him between two foes, and Llewellyn bravely
turning to meet this new enemy, he was surprised and killed—very
meanly, for he was unarmed and defenceless. His head was struck off and
sent to London, where it was fixed upon the Tower, encircled with a
wreath, some say of ivy, some say of willow, some say of silver, to
make it look like a ghastly coin in ridicule of the prediction.
David, however, still held out for six months, though eagerly sought
after by the King, and hunted by his own countrymen. One of them
finally betrayed him with his wife and children. He was sentenced to be
hanged, drawn, and quartered; and from that time this became the
established punishment of Traitors in England—a punishment wholly
without excuse, as being revolting, vile, and cruel, after its object
is dead; and which has no sense in it, as its only real degradation
(and that nothing can blot out) is to the country that permits on any
consideration such abominable barbarity.
Wales was now subdued. The Queen giving birth to a young prince in the
Castle of Carnarvon, the King showed him to the Welsh people as their
countryman, and called him Prince of Wales; a title that has ever since
been borne by the heir-apparent to the English throne—which that little
Prince soon became, by the death of his elder brother. The King did
better things for the Welsh than that, by improving their laws and
encouraging their trade. Disturbances still took place, chiefly
occasioned by the avarice and pride of the English Lords, on whom Welsh
lands and castles had been bestowed; but they were subdued, and the
country never rose again. There is a legend that to prevent the people
from being incited to rebellion by the songs of their bards and
harpers, Edward had them all put to death. Some of them may have fallen
among other men who held out against the King; but this general
slaughter is, I think, a fancy of the harpers themselves, who, I dare
say, made a song about it many years afterwards, and sang it by the
Welsh firesides until it came to be believed.
The foreign war of the reign of Edward the First arose in this way. The
crews of two vessels, one a Norman ship, and the other an English ship,
happened to go to the same place in their boats to fill their casks
with fresh water. Being rough angry fellows, they began to quarrel, and
then to fight—the English with their fists; the Normans with their
knives—and, in the fight, a Norman was killed. The Norman crew, instead
of revenging themselves upon those English sailors with whom they had
quarrelled (who were too strong for them, I suspect), took to their
ship again in a great rage, attacked the first English ship they met,
laid hold of an unoffending merchant who happened to be on board, and
brutally hanged him in the rigging of their own vessel with a dog at
his feet. This so enraged the English sailors that there was no
restraining them; and whenever, and wherever, English sailors met
Norman sailors, they fell upon each other tooth and nail. The Irish and
Dutch sailors took part with the English; the French and Genoese
sailors helped the Normans; and thus the greater part of the mariners
sailing over the sea became, in their way, as violent and raging as the
sea itself when it is disturbed.
King Edward’s fame had been so high abroad that he had been chosen to
decide a difference between France and another foreign power, and had
lived upon the Continent three years. At first, neither he nor the
French King Philip (the good Louis had been dead some time) interfered
in these quarrels; but when a fleet of eighty English ships engaged and
utterly defeated a Norman fleet of two hundred, in a pitched battle
fought round a ship at anchor, in which no quarter was given, the
matter became too serious to be passed over. King Edward, as Duke of
Guienne, was summoned to present himself before the King of France, at
Paris, and answer for the damage done by his sailor subjects. At first,
he sent the Bishop of London as his representative, and then his
brother Edmund, who was married to the French Queen’s mother. I am
afraid Edmund was an easy man, and allowed himself to be talked over by
his charming relations, the French court ladies; at all events, he was
induced to give up his brother’s dukedom for forty days—as a mere form,
the French King said, to satisfy his honour—and he was so very much
astonished, when the time was out, to find that the French King had no
idea of giving it up again, that I should not wonder if it hastened his
death: which soon took place.
King Edward was a King to win his foreign dukedom back again, if it
could be won by energy and valour. He raised a large army, renounced
his allegiance as Duke of Guienne, and crossed the sea to carry war
into France. Before any important battle was fought, however, a truce
was agreed upon for two years; and in the course of that time, the Pope
effected a reconciliation. King Edward, who was now a widower, having
lost his affectionate and good wife, Eleanor, married the French King’s
sister, Margaret; and the Prince of Wales was contracted to the French
King’s daughter Isabella.
Out of bad things, good things sometimes arise. Out of this hanging of
the innocent merchant, and the bloodshed and strife it caused, there
came to be established one of the greatest powers that the English
people now possess. The preparations for the war being very expensive,
and King Edward greatly wanting money, and being very arbitrary in his
ways of raising it, some of the Barons began firmly to oppose him. Two
of them, in particular, Humphrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford, and Roger
Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, were so stout against him, that they maintained
he had no right to command them to head his forces in Guienne, and
flatly refused to go there. ‘By Heaven, Sir Earl,’ said the King to the
Earl of Hereford, in a great passion, ‘you shall either go or be
hanged!’ ‘By Heaven, Sir King,’ replied the Earl, ‘I will neither go
nor yet will I be hanged!’ and both he and the other Earl sturdily left
the court, attended by many Lords. The King tried every means of
raising money. He taxed the clergy, in spite of all the Pope said to
the contrary; and when they refused to pay, reduced them to submission,
by saying Very well, then they had no claim upon the government for
protection, and any man might plunder them who would—which a good many
men were very ready to do, and very readily did, and which the clergy
found too losing a game to be played at long. He seized all the wool
and leather in the hands of the merchants, promising to pay for it some
fine day; and he set a tax upon the exportation of wool, which was so
unpopular among the traders that it was called ‘The evil toll.’ But all
would not do. The Barons, led by those two great Earls, declared any
taxes imposed without the consent of Parliament, unlawful; and the
Parliament refused to impose taxes, until the King should confirm
afresh the two Great Charters, and should solemnly declare in writing,
that there was no power in the country to raise money from the people,
evermore, but the power of Parliament representing all ranks of the
people. The King was very unwilling to diminish his own power by
allowing this great privilege in the Parliament; but there was no help
for it, and he at last complied. We shall come to another King
by-and-by, who might have saved his head from rolling off, if he had
profited by this example.
The people gained other benefits in Parliament from the good sense and
wisdom of this King. Many of the laws were much improved; provision was
made for the greater safety of travellers, and the apprehension of
thieves and murderers; the priests were prevented from holding too much
land, and so becoming too powerful; and Justices of the Peace were
first appointed (though not at first under that name) in various parts
of the country.
And now we come to Scotland, which was the great and lasting trouble of
the reign of King Edward the First.
About thirteen years after King Edward’s coronation, Alexander the
Third, the King of Scotland, died of a fall from his horse. He had been
married to Margaret, King Edward’s sister. All their children being
dead, the Scottish crown became the right of a young Princess only
eight years old, the daughter of Eric, King of Norway, who had married
a daughter of the deceased sovereign. King Edward proposed, that the
Maiden of Norway, as this Princess was called, should be engaged to be
married to his eldest son; but, unfortunately, as she was coming over
to England she fell sick, and landing on one of the Orkney Islands,
died there. A great commotion immediately began in Scotland, where as
many as thirteen noisy claimants to the vacant throne started up and
made a general confusion.
King Edward being much renowned for his sagacity and justice, it seems
to have been agreed to refer the dispute to him. He accepted the trust,
and went, with an army, to the Border-land where England and Scotland
joined. There, he called upon the Scottish gentlemen to meet him at the
Castle of Norham, on the English side of the river Tweed; and to that
Castle they came. But, before he would take any step in the business,
he required those Scottish gentlemen, one and all, to do homage to him
as their superior Lord; and when they hesitated, he said, ‘By holy
Edward, whose crown I wear, I will have my rights, or I will die in
maintaining them!’ The Scottish gentlemen, who had not expected this,
were disconcerted, and asked for three weeks to think about it.
At the end of the three weeks, another meeting took place, on a green
plain on the Scottish side of the river. Of all the competitors for the
Scottish throne, there were only two who had any real claim, in right
of their near kindred to the Royal Family. These were John Baliol and
Robert Bruce: and the right was, I have no doubt, on the side of John
Baliol. At this particular meeting John Baliol was not present, but
Robert Bruce was; and on Robert Bruce being formally asked whether he
acknowledged the King of England for his superior lord, he answered,
plainly and distinctly, Yes, he did. Next day, John Baliol appeared,
and said the same. This point settled, some arrangements were made for
inquiring into their titles.
The inquiry occupied a pretty long time—more than a year. While it was
going on, King Edward took the opportunity of making a journey through
Scotland, and calling upon the Scottish people of all degrees to
acknowledge themselves his vassals, or be imprisoned until they did. In
the meanwhile, Commissioners were appointed to conduct the inquiry, a
Parliament was held at Berwick about it, the two claimants were heard
at full length, and there was a vast amount of talking. At last, in the
great hall of the Castle of Berwick, the King gave judgment in favour
of John Baliol: who, consenting to receive his crown by the King of
England’s favour and permission, was crowned at Scone, in an old stone
chair which had been used for ages in the abbey there, at the
coronations of Scottish Kings. Then, King Edward caused the great seal
of Scotland, used since the late King’s death, to be broken in four
pieces, and placed in the English Treasury; and considered that he now
had Scotland (according to the common saying) under his thumb.
Scotland had a strong will of its own yet, however. King Edward,
determined that the Scottish King should not forget he was his vassal,
summoned him repeatedly to come and defend himself and his judges
before the English Parliament when appeals from the decisions of
Scottish courts of justice were being heard. At length, John Baliol,
who had no great heart of his own, had so much heart put into him by
the brave spirit of the Scottish people, who took this as a national
insult, that he refused to come any more. Thereupon, the King further
required him to help him in his war abroad (which was then in
progress), and to give up, as security for his good behaviour in
future, the three strong Scottish Castles of Jedburgh, Roxburgh, and
Berwick. Nothing of this being done; on the contrary, the Scottish
people concealing their King among their mountains in the Highlands and
showing a determination to resist; Edward marched to Berwick with an
army of thirty thousand foot, and four thousand horse; took the Castle,
and slew its whole garrison, and the inhabitants of the town as
well—men, women, and children. Lord Warrenne, Earl of Surrey, then went
on to the Castle of Dunbar, before which a battle was fought, and the
whole Scottish army defeated with great slaughter. The victory being
complete, the Earl of Surrey was left as guardian of Scotland; the
principal offices in that kingdom were given to Englishmen; the more
powerful Scottish Nobles were obliged to come and live in England; the
Scottish crown and sceptre were brought away; and even the old stone
chair was carried off and placed in Westminster Abbey, where you may
see it now. Baliol had the Tower of London lent him for a residence,
with permission to range about within a circle of twenty miles. Three
years afterwards he was allowed to go to Normandy, where he had
estates, and where he passed the remaining six years of his life: far
more happily, I dare say, than he had lived for a long while in angry
Scotland.
Now, there was, in the West of Scotland, a gentleman of small fortune,
named William Wallace, the second son of a Scottish knight. He was a
man of great size and great strength; he was very brave and daring;
when he spoke to a body of his countrymen, he could rouse them in a
wonderful manner by the power of his burning words; he loved Scotland
dearly, and he hated England with his utmost might. The domineering
conduct of the English who now held the places of trust in Scotland
made them as intolerable to the proud Scottish people as they had been,
under similar circumstances, to the Welsh; and no man in all Scotland
regarded them with so much smothered rage as William Wallace. One day,
an Englishman in office, little knowing what he was, affronted _him_.
Wallace instantly struck him dead, and taking refuge among the rocks
and hills, and there joining with his countryman, Sir William Douglas,
who was also in arms against King Edward, became the most resolute and
undaunted champion of a people struggling for their independence that
ever lived upon the earth.
The English Guardian of the Kingdom fled before him, and, thus
encouraged, the Scottish people revolted everywhere, and fell upon the
English without mercy. The Earl of Surrey, by the King’s commands,
raised all the power of the Border-counties, and two English armies
poured into Scotland. Only one Chief, in the face of those armies,
stood by Wallace, who, with a force of forty thousand men, awaited the
invaders at a place on the river Forth, within two miles of Stirling.
Across the river there was only one poor wooden bridge, called the
bridge of Kildean—so narrow, that but two men could cross it abreast.
With his eyes upon this bridge, Wallace posted the greater part of his
men among some rising grounds, and waited calmly. When the English army
came up on the opposite bank of the river, messengers were sent forward
to offer terms. Wallace sent them back with a defiance, in the name of
the freedom of Scotland. Some of the officers of the Earl of Surrey in
command of the English, with _their_ eyes also on the bridge, advised
him to be discreet and not hasty. He, however, urged to immediate
battle by some other officers, and particularly by Cressingham, King
Edward’s treasurer, and a rash man, gave the word of command to
advance. One thousand English crossed the bridge, two abreast; the
Scottish troops were as motionless as stone images. Two thousand
English crossed; three thousand, four thousand, five. Not a feather,
all this time, had been seen to stir among the Scottish bonnets. Now,
they all fluttered. ‘Forward, one party, to the foot of the Bridge!’
cried Wallace, ‘and let no more English cross! The rest, down with me
on the five thousand who have come over, and cut them all to pieces!’
It was done, in the sight of the whole remainder of the English army,
who could give no help. Cressingham himself was killed, and the Scotch
made whips for their horses of his skin.
King Edward was abroad at this time, and during the successes on the
Scottish side which followed, and which enabled bold Wallace to win the
whole country back again, and even to ravage the English borders. But,
after a few winter months, the King returned, and took the field with
more than his usual energy. One night, when a kick from his horse as
they both lay on the ground together broke two of his ribs, and a cry
arose that he was killed, he leaped into his saddle, regardless of the
pain he suffered, and rode through the camp. Day then appearing, he
gave the word (still, of course, in that bruised and aching state)
Forward! and led his army on to near Falkirk, where the Scottish forces
were seen drawn up on some stony ground, behind a morass. Here, he
defeated Wallace, and killed fifteen thousand of his men. With the
shattered remainder, Wallace drew back to Stirling; but, being pursued,
set fire to the town that it might give no help to the English, and
escaped. The inhabitants of Perth afterwards set fire to their houses
for the same reason, and the King, unable to find provisions, was
forced to withdraw his army.
Another Robert Bruce, the grandson of him who had disputed the Scottish
crown with Baliol, was now in arms against the King (that elder Bruce
being dead), and also John Comyn, Baliol’s nephew. These two young men
might agree in opposing Edward, but could agree in nothing else, as
they were rivals for the throne of Scotland. Probably it was because
they knew this, and knew what troubles must arise even if they could
hope to get the better of the great English King, that the principal
Scottish people applied to the Pope for his interference. The Pope, on
the principle of losing nothing for want of trying to get it, very
coolly claimed that Scotland belonged to him; but this was a little too
much, and the Parliament in a friendly manner told him so.
In the spring time of the year one thousand three hundred and three,
the King sent Sir John Segrave, whom he made Governor of Scotland, with
twenty thousand men, to reduce the rebels. Sir John was not as careful
as he should have been, but encamped at Rosslyn, near Edinburgh, with
his army divided into three parts. The Scottish forces saw their
advantage; fell on each part separately; defeated each; and killed all
the prisoners. Then, came the King himself once more, as soon as a
great army could be raised; he passed through the whole north of
Scotland, laying waste whatsoever came in his way; and he took up his
winter quarters at Dunfermline. The Scottish cause now looked so
hopeless, that Comyn and the other nobles made submission and received
their pardons. Wallace alone stood out. He was invited to surrender,
though on no distinct pledge that his life should be spared; but he
still defied the ireful King, and lived among the steep crags of the
Highland glens, where the eagles made their nests, and where the
mountain torrents roared, and the white snow was deep, and the bitter
winds blew round his unsheltered head, as he lay through many a
pitch-dark night wrapped up in his plaid. Nothing could break his
spirit; nothing could lower his courage; nothing could induce him to
forget or to forgive his country’s wrongs. Even when the Castle of
Stirling, which had long held out, was besieged by the King with every
kind of military engine then in use; even when the lead upon cathedral
roofs was taken down to help to make them; even when the King, though
an old man, commanded in the siege as if he were a youth, being so
resolved to conquer; even when the brave garrison (then found with
amazement to be not two hundred people, including several ladies) were
starved and beaten out and were made to submit on their knees, and with
every form of disgrace that could aggravate their sufferings; even
then, when there was not a ray of hope in Scotland, William Wallace was
as proud and firm as if he had beheld the powerful and relentless
Edward lying dead at his feet.
Who betrayed William Wallace in the end, is not quite certain. That he
was betrayed—probably by an attendant—is too true. He was taken to the
Castle of Dumbarton, under Sir John Menteith, and thence to London,
where the great fame of his bravery and resolution attracted immense
concourses of people to behold him. He was tried in Westminster Hall,
with a crown of laurel on his head—it is supposed because he was
reported to have said that he ought to wear, or that he would wear, a
crown there and was found guilty as a robber, a murderer, and a
traitor. What they called a robber (he said to those who tried him) he
was, because he had taken spoil from the King’s men. What they called a
murderer, he was, because he had slain an insolent Englishman. What
they called a traitor, he was not, for he had never sworn allegiance to
the King, and had ever scorned to do it. He was dragged at the tails of
horses to West Smithfield, and there hanged on a high gallows, torn
open before he was dead, beheaded, and quartered. His head was set upon
a pole on London Bridge, his right arm was sent to Newcastle, his left
arm to Berwick, his legs to Perth and Aberdeen. But, if King Edward had
had his body cut into inches, and had sent every separate inch into a
separate town, he could not have dispersed it half so far and wide as
his fame. Wallace will be remembered in songs and stories, while there
are songs and stories in the English tongue, and Scotland will hold him
dear while her lakes and mountains last.
Released from this dreaded enemy, the King made a fairer plan of
Government for Scotland, divided the offices of honour among Scottish
gentlemen and English gentlemen, forgave past offences, and thought, in
his old age, that his work was done.
But he deceived himself. Comyn and Bruce conspired, and made an
appointment to meet at Dumfries, in the church of the Minorites. There
is a story that Comyn was false to Bruce, and had informed against him
to the King; that Bruce was warned of his danger and the necessity of
flight, by receiving, one night as he sat at supper, from his friend
the Earl of Gloucester, twelve pennies and a pair of spurs; that as he
was riding angrily to keep his appointment (through a snow-storm, with
his horse’s shoes reversed that he might not be tracked), he met an
evil-looking serving man, a messenger of Comyn, whom he killed, and
concealed in whose dress he found letters that proved Comyn’s
treachery. However this may be, they were likely enough to quarrel in
any case, being hot-headed rivals; and, whatever they quarrelled about,
they certainly did quarrel in the church where they met, and Bruce drew
his dagger and stabbed Comyn, who fell upon the pavement. When Bruce
came out, pale and disturbed, the friends who were waiting for him
asked what was the matter? ‘I think I have killed Comyn,’ said he. ‘You
only think so?’ returned one of them; ‘I will make sure!’ and going
into the church, and finding him alive, stabbed him again and again.
Knowing that the King would never forgive this new deed of violence,
the party then declared Bruce King of Scotland: got him crowned at
Scone—without the chair; and set up the rebellious standard once again.
When the King heard of it he kindled with fiercer anger than he had
ever shown yet. He caused the Prince of Wales and two hundred and
seventy of the young nobility to be knighted—the trees in the Temple
Gardens were cut down to make room for their tents, and they watched
their armour all night, according to the old usage: some in the Temple
Church: some in Westminster Abbey—and at the public Feast which then
took place, he swore, by Heaven, and by two swans covered with gold
network which his minstrels placed upon the table, that he would avenge
the death of Comyn, and would punish the false Bruce. And before all
the company, he charged the Prince his son, in case that he should die
before accomplishing his vow, not to bury him until it was fulfilled.
Next morning the Prince and the rest of the young Knights rode away to
the Border-country to join the English army; and the King, now weak and
sick, followed in a horse-litter.
Bruce, after losing a battle and undergoing many dangers and much
misery, fled to Ireland, where he lay concealed through the winter.
That winter, Edward passed in hunting down and executing Bruce’s
relations and adherents, sparing neither youth nor age, and showing no
touch of pity or sign of mercy. In the following spring, Bruce
reappeared and gained some victories. In these frays, both sides were
grievously cruel. For instance—Bruce’s two brothers, being taken
captives desperately wounded, were ordered by the King to instant
execution. Bruce’s friend Sir John Douglas, taking his own Castle of
Douglas out of the hands of an English Lord, roasted the dead bodies of
the slaughtered garrison in a great fire made of every movable within
it; which dreadful cookery his men called the Douglas Larder. Bruce,
still successful, however, drove the Earl of Pembroke and the Earl of
Gloucester into the Castle of Ayr and laid siege to it.
The King, who had been laid up all the winter, but had directed the
army from his sick-bed, now advanced to Carlisle, and there, causing
the litter in which he had travelled to be placed in the Cathedral as
an offering to Heaven, mounted his horse once more, and for the last
time. He was now sixty-nine years old, and had reigned thirty-five
years. He was so ill, that in four days he could go no more than six
miles; still, even at that pace, he went on and resolutely kept his
face towards the Border. At length, he lay down at the village of
Burgh-upon-Sands; and there, telling those around him to impress upon
the Prince that he was to remember his father’s vow, and was never to
rest until he had thoroughly subdued Scotland, he yielded up his last
breath.